By Barbara H. Peterson Farmwars.info
Codex Isn’t Coming, It’s Here!
Why is there so much denial by consumer advocate groups such as the National Health Federation(1) (NHF) about Barry Soetoro implementing the U.S. Codex council via Executive Order(2)? What is it that they don’t want you to see? Just do the research, and you will discover that we have been up to our eyeballs in Codex since 1962 and don’t even know it.
Codex is a subsidiary body of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations and the World Health Organization (WHO). Codex develops international food safety and quality standards, such as standards concerning the safety of food additives. Standards set by Codex traditionally served as a minimum floor for less developed countries. The U.S. has participated in Codex since its formation in 1962 and has shared its technical expertise in efforts to aid less developed countries.
http://www.cspinet.org/reports/codex.htm
We are being lulled into complacency with declarations that Codex isn’t here yet, not to worry, while the elephant in the room is getting bigger all the time. Here is a quote from an article posted on the NHF site:
While the Executive Order is real, it is not imposing Codex rules on the United States. As NHF lobbyist Lee Bechtel correctly points out, “There is no direct policy link between this Council and Codex, or with the way in which the FDA regulates food and food supplements.”
http://www.thenhf.com/press_releases/pr_26_jun_2010.html
No direct link with the way in which the FDA regulates food and food supplements? Don’t worry, Codex is not here, we have nothing to worry about, just go about your daily business. In a pig’s eye. Do the research. Look through the Codex, USDA, and CDC sites. I will provide the links. Don’t just believe what someone says because he/she belongs to a large organization that is “too big” to be wrong!
United States – Mandatory Compliance and Implementation
While we are busy living the American Dream, Codex is weaving its way through the fabric of our lives via regulations and corporate compliance without so much as a whimper from the organizations we count on to do our fighting for us.
While they are saying that Codex is not here, it is in fact, being implemented right before our eyes under the framework of disease prevention. The following is taken from the CDC site:
The Current Legal Framework: International Health Regulations
The regulations, which play a central, albeit limited, role in addressing global disease outbreaks (Table 1), have served as the primary legally binding framework for preventing the international spread of infectious disease (Table 2). In addition to its other legal and policy options for promoting international public health, WHO’s World Health Assembly is specifically authorized to adopt regulations concerning “sanitary and quarantine requirements and other procedures designed to prevent the international spread of disease” (7, art. 21[a]). The twin objectives of the regulations balance “maximum security against the international spread of diseases with a minimum interference with world traffic” (1, Foreword).
Like most international agreements, the regulations are to be implemented through national laws and policies that incorporate or otherwise accommodate the regulations’ various provisions, minimum requirements, and limitations….
http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/eid/vol3no1/plotkin.htm
Just in case you missed it, I’ll say it again. The information in the quote above came directly from the CDC.gov site. You know, the agency that is supposed to develop those “science-based guidelines” in Soetoro’s Executive Order – Establishing the National Prevention, Health Promotion, and Public Health Council. THE CODEX COUNCIL.
This is merely a follow-through of the already issued U.S. Codex Strategic Plan:
In 1995, the U.S. Codex office, headquartered within the Food Safety and Inspection Service of USDA, issued the U.S. Codex Strategic Plan. The plan made five recommendations:
1. The scientific basis for Codex decisions should be strengthened.
2. The management of the Codex Alimentarius should be improved.
3. Codex should use U.S. approaches to risk management.
4. Balanced non-governmental participation in Codex proceedings should be encouraged.
5. The staffing and budget for the U.S. Codex office should be increased.
http://www.cspinet.org/reports/codex.htm
And just who is in charge of guiding the long-term implementation of the U.S. Codex Strategic Plan? The Codex Alimentarius Steering Committees:
Officials from the Departments of Agriculture, Health and Human Services, State, and Commerce, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative participate on the U.S. Codex Steering Committees.
Charge: Through a process of consensus, the committee will:
Address broad policy issues, such as the appropriate overall strategies the U.S. should pursue in the Codex process.
Provide guidance, based on sound science, to U.S. Codex Delegates and U.S. Codex Office on issues that have widespread implications on regulatory and trade policies.
Address issues of process, including policies and approaches that continue to assure transparency, within Codex, both nationally and internationally.
Define, and serve as, the interface between the SPS Steering Group and the Codex Committees.
Be available to address issues that are referred by the Senior-level Technical Committee for Codex.
Provide advice and guidance on staffing, organization, and funding of the U.S. Codex Office.
Address issues of dates, location, and funding for U.S. hosted meetings, including achieving consensus on sources of funds from involved agencies.
Select the U.S. Delegate and Alternate Delegate to the Codex Committee on General Principles and U.S. representatives to the Codex Executive Committee whenever the U.S. is regional or Coordinating Committee representative.
http://www.fsis.usda.gov/codex_alimentarius/steering_committees/index.asp
This is not a back-door approach, it is up front, and right in our faces. We are just now beginning to see the different sub-departments being created such as the one in the Executive Order establishing the U.S. Codex council and agreeing to the U.N. science-based risk assessment approach.
So let me ask you something. If I describe an animal to you such as:
It is approximately 1000 lbs, has four feet, a mane, tail, hooves, whinnies, can be ridden with a saddle and bridle, cowboys use them for rounding up herds of cattle, and in the old west it was the major mode of transportation before the car.
Do I have to spell out H O R S E for you to know it is a horse? If all of the tenets of Codex are implementing right before our eyes, do they have to spell out C O D E X each time one is instituted for you to know it is Codex? Just look at the regulatory agencies such as the USDA and CDC websites to see it spelled out, because you won’t see it in your local organics section of the daily news, but make no mistake about it, the U.S. is a member of the Codex Alimentarius Commission, and as a requirement of membership, is legally obligated to implement Codex:
Even though the regulations pose a legal obligation for WHO members(3), [the U.S. included], who have not officially “opted out” from participating, lack of compliance has been an ongoing problem (8,9).
http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/eid/vol3no1/plotkin.htm
Codex Goals and Objectives
Let’s look at the 1999 FAO/WHO Codex Alimentarius Commission Report of the FAO/WHO Coordinating Committee for North America and South West Pacific:
ACTIVITIES OF CODEX CONTACT POINTS AND NATIONAL CODEX COMMITTEES IN THE REGION[18] (Agenda Item 7)
UNITED STATES
50. The Delegation of the United States described a number of initiatives discussed more fully in document CX/NASWP 98/7. These initiatives included the development of a strategic plan addressing five critical issues, two involving Codex operations and three involving US Codex operations. These were:
- Sound science as the basis for Codex decision making,
- Improved management of Codex Alimentarius
- United States acceptance of Codex standards
- Enhanced participation of non-governmental organizations in the Codex process, and
- Management and effectiveness of US Codex
- The Delegation of the United States complimented the Secretariat on improvements made since the last session of the Commission especially in the use of electronic dissemination of information and working documents for Codex Committee meetings. In order to enhance transparency, US Codex was establishing public forums to discuss US positions on issues before Codex sessions and how Codex standards would be evaluated in US standard-setting activities since there was a lack of information about the consequences of Codex under the WTO Agreements among industry and consumers. It noted the need for a public understanding that, while Codex standards based on sound principles of science could be utilized as a basis for developing national food regulations, national governments maintained their sovereign right to set their own levels of protection [they maintain this right, yet if exercised, run afoul of the WTO Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures and become a barrier to trade]. In this connection, US Codex had been making information on Codex available through its Web Site linked to other US agencies such as Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and FDA.
http://www.fao.org/docrep/meeting/005/x0084e/x0084e09.htm
Now let’s take a look at the USDA site under Codex, and the last Codex meeting notes:
The United States was represented by the U.S. Delegate, Dr. Barbara Schneeman, FDA Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition; and the U.S. Alternate Delegate, Dr. Allison Yates, USDA Agricultural Research Service.
The session was very productive, with substantial progress made on a number of important work items. Specifically, the Committee agreed to:
…Draft General Principles for Establishing Nutrient Reference Values (NRVs) of Vitamins and Minerals for the General Population (for food labeling purposes);
Continue to consider at Step 3 the presentation of the NRVs for vitamins and minerals;
Advance new work proposals to the 33rd CAC session for approval to:
Amend the Codex Guidelines on Nutrition Labeling to establish Nutrient Reference Values for nutrients associated with risk of diet-related noncommunicable diseases for the general population;
Amend the General Principles for the Addition of Essential Nutrients to Foods (CAC/GL 9-1987);
http://www.fsis.usda.gov/codex_alimentarius/Delegate_Report_31CCNFSDU/index.asp
The next meeting is scheduled from 05/07/2010 to 09/07/2010. This meeting, according to the notes above, will set the Codex guidelines for both minimum and maximum Nutrient Reference Values (NRVs) of vitamins and minerals for the general population. The NRVs list is scheduled for completion by 2012.
Sound Science and Risk-Based Assessment
Just how will these Nutrient Reference Values (NRVs) be determined? They will be based on “sound science’s”(4) risk-based assessment.
7. The Committee noted the following decisions taken by the 22nd Session of the Codex Alimentarius Commission (July 1997) concerning Risk Analysis[5]:
The Commission adopted Statements of Principle Relating to the Role of Food Safety Risk Assessment for inclusion into a new Appendix to the Procedural Manual[6], with the understanding that the Codex Committee on General Principles would further consider issues related to equivalence and food safety objectives.
http://www.fao.org/docrep/meeting/005/x0084e/x0084e05.htm
The Commission has adopted a risk analysis procedure called Food Safety Risk Assessment into its Procedural Manual. Let’s go to the Codex Procedural Manual to find out how this Food Safety Risk Assessment is to be implemented:
RISK MANAGEMENT
27) While recognizing the dual purposes of the Codex Alimentarius are protecting the health of consumers and ensuring fair practices in the food trade, Codex decisions and recommendations on risk management should have as their primary objective the protection of the health of consumers. Unjustified differences in the level of consumer health protection to address similar risks in different situations should be avoided.
Codex Procedural Manual (PDF)
Pay special attention to the terms “equivalence” and “unjustified differences in the level of consumer health protection to address similar risks in different situations should be avoided.” In other words, the lowest common denominator should be used in order to accommodate everyone everywhere, from child to adult, adult to elderly, it doesn’t matter, the same standard will be used for everyone. That is the goal of Codex’s Food Safety Risk Assessment procedure.
What Does the WTO Have to Do With It?
The SPS Agreement [Sanitary and phytosanitary measures(5)] designated the Codex Alimentarius Commission as one of the sources for recognized international standards for use in resolving trade disputes between nations. Regulatory requirements of a nation that are based on Codex standards are presumed to be consistent with the SPS Agreement. Regulatory requirements that exceed Codex standards may be challenged as trade barriers.
As a result, Codex standards now carry legal significance within the United States because other countries may challenge any U.S. regulatory standard as a trade barrier if the standard exceeds those set by Codex. Thus, due to the Uruguay Round Agreement, the Codex Alimentarius Commission has obtained unprecedented influence over U.S. food safety and quality standards. Threats to U.S. regulations are already being made in the context of Codex proceedings.
http://www.cspinet.org/reports/codex.htm
In other words, Codex standards, which will include Codex guidelines for both minimum and maximum Nutrient Reference Values (NRVs) of vitamins and minerals for the general population, are to be the same across the board. Any nation not conforming to these standards creates a barrier to trade.
4)…The SPS agreement provides, for members’ use, where applicable, certain established “international standards, guidelines or recommendations” (rather than their own standards) to promote international consistency on these measures. A member must justify, scientifically and otherwise, implementation of higher standards if they result in a greater restriction on trade than the stipulated international standard (27, art. 3 and Annex A, pars. 2-3).
http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/eid/vol3no1/plotkin.htm
Nutrient levels higher than the Codex NRVs are unacceptable, and create a barrier to trade.
So just how is Codex affecting us now?
While the powers that be are busy figuring out how to deceive the people, we just go about our daily lives, shopping at the corner mega-store, and pick up our irradiated, pasteurized, chemicalized food legally labeled as “raw,” such as California almonds(6).
Add to the mix so-called “natural” vitamins that have never even seen a real nutrient much less possessed one because the difference between real and manufactured vitamins and nutrients is not recognized by Codex standards, and we continue on as if nothing is happening with our heads in a chemical induced stupor, thinking that the Codex depopulation through nutrient starvation agenda hasn’t hit us yet while in reality we are smack dab in the middle of it.
Wake up! Codex is here, live and in color and we are being led down the primrose path one step at a time by those who stand to make a tidy profit from our ignorance, while the compromised organics industry shouts the battle cry yet secretly counts the projected profits gained by our ignorance and willingness to not ask too many questions and simply follow its lead straight into Codex compliance. These corporate whores are out to get your money anyway they can, and deception is just part of the game. Codex with an “organic” label is still Codex, just as a sheep with lipstick on is still a sheep.
The Bottom Line
We are already having to deal with food that is injected with foreign genes (GMOs), blasted with pesticides, irradiated beyond recognition, pasteurized, homogenized, scraped off a slaughterhouse floor, and making us sicker by the minute, and now Codex guidelines are about to set the minimum and maximum levels of so-called “nutrients” we are allowed to have. If it doesn’t meet the minimum NRV guideline, just add a little more GMO such as golden rice, chock full of artificial inserted “vitamins” to the food supply and force feed it to the public via stealth, free trade sanctions and the SPS agreement, and by all means make sure that the upper nutrient level wouldn’t keep a hamster alive. And if a company or nation doesn’t meet Codex guidelines? Then it is creating a barrier to free trade and can be prosecuted under the law.
And we just go along with it. Better to run to the corner store and get more of those genetically engineered foods and vitamins designed to strip us of our humanity and alter our DNA so that big pharma can keep us in its death grip and suck the remaining life out of our bones by “treating” the diseases created by our “new and improved” lifestyles with even more “new and improved” designer drugs. Yes Martha, there is a Santa Claus. Here, take this pill.
© 2010 Barbara H. Peterson
Inline Linked References:
1) http://www.thenhf.com/press_releases/pr_26_jun_2010.html
3) http://www.who.int/countries/usa/en/
4) http://www.fao.org/docrep/meeting/005/x0084e/x0084e09.htm
5) http://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/sps_e/sps_e.htm
6) http://www.naturalnews.com/021776.html
July 8, 2010 at 8:17 am
Oh god.
Here is what I suggest we all can do.
Barbara, with your permission, may we:
A) Cross-post this article to as many blogs as we can
B) Dial in to radio talk shows
C) Forward this article to those in a position to spread word, and to those within the health industry
D) Write letters to the local newspaper editors (who are more inclined to print hush-hush stuff than others. And why should this be hush-hush, anyway? The answer is that there is no reason, but we all know that anyway)
Barbara, is it okay for this to be reprinted, and may we forward this article to other journalists for reprint in their newspapers, on their blogs, etc? Please advise.
Thank you,
Drina
July 8, 2010 at 9:08 am
Hi Drina,
Reprinting is encouraged, as long as the author’s name is included, as well as a link to the site.
Thanks for spreading the word!
July 8, 2010 at 10:44 am
Hi Barbara
Thank you! With that known, I will forward this widely as I can.
Also, please know that a reference to the site and certainly including your name would always have been assumed, at least by me! I also hope it wouldn’t occur to anyone else to do otherwise, but thank you for mentioning it! And for all this great research (wow) and all that you do. Best wishes, Drina
July 8, 2010 at 8:25 am
PS it is true that some vitamins and herbs have side-effects in large quantities. But that is the key. In large quantities. Very large, and very long-term.
Even the FDA posted to an attack article about herbs, that one woman with liver veno occlusive disease (in which arteries to the liver constrict) as a result of using comfrey, had used it in massive quantities for ten years ongoing. They based this statement on CDC facts. Yet they attacked the herb as dangerous (and in fact some caution is merited, but only over long-term use), and even chamomile was called dangerous because ONE person had an anaphylactic shock reaction. That is so rare it is ridiculous! Even as I post cautions to my article that the occasional person may be allergic to chamomile and members of the aster family, I still have yet to see it happen. It is rare, very rare. Anaphylactic shock? Good god, that is unheard of. And here the CDC was quoted by the FDA, attacking chamomile as extremely dangerous and one had better stay away from it to protect one’s life. Such “Science”. “Real medical school science” as many people think of the mainstream medical school training.
The FDA to date has been woefully inadequate in its nutritional guidelines, and the CODEX is bound to be similar. Further, to require the same dosages for everybody all across the board, regardless of individualized needs, is crockpot “Science” bound to make people sick.
EXAMPLES:
The Alliance for Natural Health just posted an article about the fact that it is now being debated whether or not calcium should be added to the waters as well as fluoride. People posted responses about clogged shower heads et al. But what about kidney stones? Good god, does anybody know how common this awful malaise is? I was shocked when working at an integrative pharmacy, to see how many people came in with this serious and horrifically painful, agonizing actually, condition. I estimate that 15-20% of the people had the problem! I am not kidding. And it is related to impaired calcium metabolism.
So we all should have calcium supplements because we all need it? Kaka. For some people, this could be the very last thing they ever needed, it could put them in their hospital beds and they couldn’t escape the source of their problem! How nice.
Adults and children have different supplemental requirements too. Those with illnesses have different requirements from healthy individuals, and healthy people all have different needs too, depending on their constitutional tendencies, heredity, etc.
USA out of my alimentary canal, and NOW!!
It just goes to underscore what Downsize DC wrote to constituents: That over-regulation is our doomspell where people beg and plead for it as “protection”. Nothing could be further from the truth.
This is control mania run amok, disguised as good intentions (and sometimes even informed by it, but going overboard and being short-sighted. Or at times, very deliberate. After reading enough health and FDA facts, I have come to conclude very clearly that the latter is the case in the USA. If so, then CODEX is bound to be informed by malice too. Yuck. Time for us to retire them).
–Drina
July 8, 2010 at 9:21 am
P.S. This is from the FDA site:
Codex Alimentarius Commission
Under the WHO umbrella, the Codex Alimentarius Commission develops food standards, guidelines and codes of practice under the Joint FAO/WHO Food Standards Programs. FDA participates and exercises leadership in relevant Codex committees. Harmonization and Multilateral Relations representatives coordinate Codex activities within FDA and other U.S. agencies to encourage the development of science-based, international food safety and labeling standards.
http://www.fda.gov/InternationalPrograms/HarmonizationInitiatives/ucm114632.htm
July 8, 2010 at 5:32 pm
Barbara, I have a suggestion that I’ve not seen made in regard to this particular US “commission” and/or “delegation (but it has crept up at times where local police agencies are involved), which I am making because I think you will agree that individual action is necessary rather than simply “appealing to government”. (Something so penitent in such an approach – like children or serfs – and almost as distasteful as “going along”.)
Specifically, I am recommending that the task be undertaken to publicly identify those individuals who are part of these groups related to Codex Alimentarius (at least in the US), not just the head of it but every single member. Put individual faces and names on this “commission” and “delegation” – and any other government body – created to write regulations related to control the mutually voluntary interactions related to “health/food”, the broad human activity area at which Codex Alimentarius aims. Making the identities of these government appointees/bureaucrats public will enable those who do *not* agree with their activities to negatively Social Preference them – withdraw their voluntary association – if these appointees/bureaucrats are not amenable to ceasing their government activities when the disapproval of many is made apparent in written or spoken word.
However, it is the enforcers of these regulations who are the real problem! Without the enforcers – those with the guns and the willingness to use them and other weapons of physical force – all of the regulations/edicts/laws/mandates/etc of any government agency/bureaucrat/executive (including the President) are just so many words. How many of the commission/delegation members do you think would actually get out in the streets and enforce those regulations they create stemming from Codex Alimentarius? I would venture that none would do so – they will turn that task over to the enforcers.
Therefore, the negative Social Preferencing recommended above is even more important in regard to agents of enforcement. Making their identities known – photos with names and locations – on the Internet will enable anyone truly desirous of a liberatous society (truly one of liberty) to withdraw or avoid voluntary association with those individuals who are in actuality (by their actions) opposed to such a society. When significant numbers of people refuse to voluntarily associate with enforcers who have not been persuaded from their activities by logical reasoning alone, many of them will cease these roles. And relatively few replacements will step forward because of the effectiveness of this same peaceful persuasive method. Regulations without enforcers are simply words that can be ignored, or at most viewed as just the creators’ opinion of what they think is “desirable”.
More in regard to this type of persuasion, “Tax/Regulation Protests are Not Enough: Relationship of Self-Responsibility and Social Order”.
http://selfsip.org/focus/protestsnotenough.html
July 8, 2010 at 9:30 pm
Hear ye, hear ye!
Beautifully said, Kitty and thank you for weighing this in! Brava.
July 8, 2010 at 10:56 pm
The Alliance for Natural Health may have good news about this.
“ANH–USA has opposed the so-called Food Safety Bill as a threat to natural health and health freedom. As we reported to you in April, we have been working to improve the Senate’s version of the bill. In particular, we succeeded in preventing language that would have committed the US to harmonization of food standards with the rest of the world under a completely flawed process known as CODEX. ”
http://www.anh-usa.org/action-alert-on-the-senate-food-safety-bill/
July 9, 2010 at 6:32 am
How can they have prevented the US harmonization of food standards with the rest of the world under Codex when we are already committed and have been for years? Yes, they might have prevented language from a bill, but that does not change the already existing language within our Codex agreements with the UN, which commits us to harmonization under the WTO or face trade sanctions.
July 9, 2010 at 7:50 am
Hi Barbara
I have not seen the text of either bill so I cannot comment. But I see your point. Toes crossed and praying. And all we can do is get proactively involved.
What do you think the solutions are to effecting change in this area? Your thoughts about this, and everybody else’s too (thank you Kitty!) would be empowering to us all.
Hey, other friends here, let’s hear from you, we love to! Input, ideas? Thanks, Drina
July 9, 2010 at 5:27 pm
There is a way out of this mess. A freeman on the land is not subject to the CDC regulations! Go to: http://www.thinkfree.ca I think that when you see what Robert-Arthur has done, you will see how you can stop the CDC corporation. The “Notice of understanding and intent and claim of right” is the key to victory! John-Robert P.S. It works the same in the US as Canada.